http://blog.guessbox.io/http://blog.guessbox.io/favicon.pngGuessBox.io Bloghttp://blog.guessbox.io/Ghost 2.2Fri, 16 Nov 2018 17:38:52 GMT60Book authors and screenwriters use principles of storytelling to write compelling works of art. Would it be too much to use the same principles to write enchanting cold emails?

Storytelling is an insanely powerful marketing tool, and it’s nothing new. Everyday we are bombarded with tiny stories told through a Facebook sponsored post, or a 15-second video ad on YouTube. Even more so if we seek entertainment on TV or radio.

There’s a reason why almost every ad - for better or worse - tries to tell us a story. It’s because good stories resonate with us so powerfully that they literally influence our brain chemistry.

In a insightful talk at TEDxStockholm, presentations expert David JP Phillips tells us that the core of a captivating story is emotional investment.

He compares the experience of a good story to falling in love, concluding that storytelling induces the same neurotransmitters and hormones that our brains release when we are head over heels - like oxytocin, serotonin, dopamine, and endorphins.

That is the gist of why, as legendary screenwriter Robert McKee put it:

“If you can harness imagination and the principles of a well-told story, then you get people rising to their feet amid thunderous applause instead of yawning and ignoring you.”

So let’s do that - let’s harness the principles of a well-told story and apply them to emails.

5 Storytelling Principles For Writing Emails

Let’s explore 5 storytelling insights from accomplished writers, and turn them into actionable tips that you can use as a creativity boost, as well as starting point to experiment with your cold email templates.

Principle #1: “The trick is that the evidence of the senses has to be present. If the story is just abstract, all telling and no showing, it doesn’t work.”

In an aptly titled (“I Am Allergic To Abstraction”) interview, when asked about the strength of storytelling, Carlo Rotella drops our first principle.

Essentially, what the award-winning writer is telling us is that if we want to activate somebody’s imagination, we need to stimulate their sensory memory first.

Which seems easier to do when you’re talking about writing an essay or a screenplay, but how can you apply this to a cold email?

It also stimulates the imagination by helping the reader visualise benefits:

“...if you saw a increase…”.

With this technique, the author makes you remember what you felt the last time you saw positive upticks on performance charts.

The next two principles come from an HBR interview given by Robert McKee, world’s best known screenwriting lecturer whose students have created many cinematographic classics that a lot of us adore to this day, like “Monthy Python and the Holy Grail” or “Forrest Gump”.

Principle #2: “Stories are how we remember; we tend to forget lists and bullet points.”

This principle needs a bit of clarification: lists and bullet points are a great way to present important data that could otherwise get lost between the sentences of your email.

But the thing is to first focus on telling a story, and then use a short list of relevant data to back it up if necessary.

Or just let go of lists entirely, and use something else to build your story.

In this example, the author of the email made an extra effort, and used an image to capture attention:

Instead of providing a dry list of features, this email tells a story about the product using several tools:

Humanisation - introduce you to {{tool}}

Relatability - new tool that helps companies understand customer experiences like never before

Relevant invitation - check out the 30 second demo of me interacting with your website

Interactivity - image and link to an actual video demo of using the tool on the prospect’s website

Within seconds we know what the product is, and that the author of the email cares about us.

Principle #3: “You emphatically do not want to tell a beginning-to-end tale describing how results meet expectations. This is boring and banal. Instead, you want to display the struggle between expectation and reality in all its nastiness.”

Failure can be more interesting than success.

Situations that went haywire, people that stood in way of our success, or just plain old life dealing us bad cards are much more relatable themes than stories in which everything went right.

Focusing only on the positives leaves no space for contrast, no room for surprise.

Whereas mixing the salty and the sweet can result in a much more engaging story.

There are ups, there are downs, there’s humor, there’s proof of skill, there’s a plot twist - it has everything.

It’s nothing like your typical job application, but it worked great nonetheless, since the author of this email is also the author of the article that it’s from.

Principle #4: “Everybody is a good storyteller from birth - the only problem is that you don’t believe it.”

At the risk of venturing too far into motivational speaking, I wanted to add this principle simply because it matters.

This principle comes from a TEDx presentation by David JP Phillips, who reminds us that writing is a form of self-expression, a form of art.

You could say that calling cold emails “art” is going too far - but is it, really? Okay, it is a little bit.

But what’s not poetic about painstakingly picking and combining the right words and pieces of information to compose a short message to somebody, sending it using an almost 30-year old information exchange protocol, and then landing a life-changing job or a great client because of it?

If you don’t believe that your story could be interesting to someone, you’ll end up writing the same generic “beginning-to-end tale describing how results meet expectations” every time.

You might not have an easy way to show that your product is worth buying, or publications in VentureBeat and Wall Street Journal that prove your writing skills for that new job.

But you definitely have an equally fascinating, albeit completely different stories to tell. You just need to find them - how do you do that? By following our final principle.

Principle #5: “The process of writing a story is messy. It's something you have to play with and explore. The first draft is a kickoff and, more often than not, always bad. You have to feel safe and be willing to make mistakes -- then take the time to fix them. Good writing is rewriting.”

The most important part of writing is reading your first draft, changing it, re-reading, switching up words, moving parts of your story around until it feels right.

Same goes for writing emails.

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what makes a great email. There are several guidelines to keep in mind, like keeping it short and focusing on the prospect. But sometimes the best email in your case will be the one that forgoes every guideline.

In the global scope of cold emailing, this also applies to outreach. You have to be willing to send different emails and accept that some of them will flop, while other versions will generate replies. That’s why we measure results from campaigns, test different approaches and optimize for the highest conversion rates.

Are you ready to email your story?

Turns out that the best marketers are already applying the same principles of storytelling that authors and screenwriters use:

Appeal to your readers’ sensoric memory

Tell your story first because that’s what people will remember - data should only enrich the story

Show both sides of the story, not just the rose-colored side

Believe that you’re a good storyteller

To get the story right, you need to rewrite a lot, be willing to make mistakes and take time to fix them

All in all, approaching your emails more as a story, and less as a pitch, should help you write campaigns that are rich, captivating and engaging. A side-note on all of this is that inspiration for marketing doesn’t need to come only from successful marketers - you can look up to artists for ideas and new techniques just as well.

Good luck

This piece was written by Will Cannon, the CEO & Founder of UpLead - a B2B sales intelligence platform.

Do you have something you want to contribute? Please review the 'write for us' page and get in touch if you think you have a good idea for a post on the GuessBox Blog.

You are probably wondering what the hell is hyper-personalization and why do I need it? Facebook, Twitter and Google provide me with plenty of targeting options already. Right?

Well... if I misrepresented you then I am sorry though what I am about to describe provides you with an arsenal of data that you can then take to Google or Facebook and run cheaper advertising campaigns, that target exactly the peopleyou want to hear your message.

But I digress... first I am going to explain how this three pronged method works and then I'll illustrate how it can be done (or at the very at least provide the tools to help you).

In the fight for brand exposure B2B companies are starting to become repetitive. Not for long...

Step 1: Gathering Advanced B2B Data

There are plenty of companies offering you the next best data set or overcharging you for a set of unverified leads they scraped from LinkedIn.

For that reason I won't discuss extracting lead data from LinkedIn because you can find dozens of bots, and tools out there that will do the job, kind of. Don't get me wrong, I love LinkedIn, it has provided me with many a clients and website traffic.

By all means harvest data off LI but you'll be missing some truly personalized information. That's why in this section, in addition to anything LI and similar business directories provide I take that information and use it to find myself even more information like:

What the lead's interests are? (Snowboarding, axel grinding - whatever that is. Put it into the spreadsheet!)

The groups they belong to across their social profiles (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn).

This starts to paint a clearer picture of the kind of person I want to sell to. Moving on...

Their past posts on these social platforms, filtered by keyword.

Locating their colleagues (particularly their boss) and unearthing any media they may have shared online.

Note: I want to make it crystal clearthat although this is starting to lean towards somewhat of a malicious side, there is nothing but purity in this prose. As you'll learn later this media isn't used for what you might think. Come on, after all, we're marketers, not telemarketers!

Approximate income status etc.

Any news appearances, or latest press releases they were involved in.

and much much more.

As you can see in the right hands this data could be gold in your communications with a prospect. And what's even better because this is data you harvest, it slots nicely into your spreadsheet, later to be used in a mail merge when you send outyour mass, hyper personalized email campaign.

And guess what? The majority of this can be completed within a Google Sheetwhich I'll show you a little bit later.

Before we end this section here are some tools that might come in handy.

Web Scraper extension for Chrome

Data-Miner (possibly... personal preference)

Linkedin Helper extension for Chrome

Dexi.io => extraction robot builder

And more importantly, Google Sheets and the following codes:

=IFERROR(CONCATENATE(IMPORTXML(A2,"//*[@id='b_results']/li[1]/div/div/cite")),"URL Not Found")

Don't concern yourself too much with the above line. In layman's terms it pulls returns the first result from a bing search, and if it can't connect or find the result the spreadsheet cell reads, URL Not Found. Otherwise, it will be a social handle like so:

As long as you have the search terms written correctly, you can use the same method to find other information (not just from search engines, but business directories or directly from social platforms. I'll post my actual spreadsheet examples soon.

=ARRAYFORMULA(CONCAT(C2:C784,"/detail/interests/groups"))

Used for appending + mass generating LI URLs that link directly to a user's group/interests. This makes the extraction process much easier. In fact, using the CONCAT and CONCATENATE functions will allow you to connect strings and data in different cells together. Super helpful.

Anyway, I may have given away a little too much already. So, let's move on.

Step 2: Setting Up Personalized Automated Email Campaigns

A while back I wrote a post detailing my favourite add-ons for Gmail. In this example, I am going to refer back to a couple of those extensions, and several new ones.

Let me ask you a question. Which email service provider (ESP) are you using for your email marketing campaign(s), funnels, or automated opt-in response?

Surprisingly, it doesn't matter all that much at the moment. As long as they allow you to upload custom data, and behavior based automatic follow-ups they will do just fine. Personally, I prefer connecting SendGrid to something like GMass and getting that deep data. However, there are many great companies like Reply, Elastic Email.

The next thing we do is pretty simple. We upload our new list of prospects along with all of that extra data and start copywriting a series of emails which would touch upon some of the information you have gathered.

Latest news article? Include it! Link to their Twitter post? Reference it in your email. Prove that you have done your research about your prospect and you will receive a much higher open, click and conversion rate.

Note: On average it still takes 2-3 emails to get a conversion so don't be bummed out if you don't strike gold with the first email. People are busy, they don't always check their phones etc. Hell, I barely reply to emails anymore.

Personalized Landing Pages Are THE Ultimate Way To Build Rapport | Photo by rawpixel / Unsplash

This might sound crazy but what if I told you that the link you include in your email or Adwords/Facebook ad could automatically be unique for each person (without the recipient knowing of course) and when they click it, the landing page they are treated to is completely customized and personalized to them and their brand? Pretty cool right?

Well... it's actually easier to do than you think. Remember all that data we captured in step 1? The trick is to append that data into the URL, as per below. These are known as URL parameters or query string parameters.

The landing page accepting this link would read it, and would automatically put the different data variables you inserted into the spots on the page you allocated. See why it's good to have plenty of data on your potential lead?

Another trick you can use that is in the same vein as the above is to have your opt-in forms automatically prepopulated with your user data. To help speed up their journey to 'yes'. Similarly, you would append your user data into the URL except the variable names would be the ID names of your opt-in form etc. Still pretty handy though.

Note: You can still include your Google Analytics code within this URL structure without breaking anything.

Retrieving this data is best done using Javascript or another server side programming language, but again there many companies you can use to simplify your process. For example, here is a WordPress Plugin called URL Params which will process this for you.

And that's it. I hope you enjoyed this post, it is still in development and will be updated regularly as I run more tests and discover, faster, better and more efficient ways to get data into the hands of people who know how to use it.

P.S If you're tech savvy, you could use Google Sheets + Ultradox + GMass to make this process run on repeat without needing intervention from you. This includes lead generation, url manipulation, and emails being sent to each new recipient on your sheet.

Hm... definitely food for thought. Thanks for reading!

Part 2: How To Create The Perfect Custom Audiences on Facebook & Google

If you have ever seen your emails going into your recipient's spam then you know how distressing not knowing what to do is. Especially if you have spent time (and money) creating the perfect email campaign.

I make a habit of checking my junk folder once a week in search of any emails that I may have missed. And to my surprise, I find higher numbers of legitimate emails from non-spam worthy companies ending up there.

Almost all the content contained within these emails did not promote big pharma or invite me to get involved in some last minute sale.

1. Avoid Using 'Triggering' Keywords

I'm not talking about keywords that trigger negative emotions people, but rather trigger your email to get flagged as spam. As discussed in The B2B Email Marketing Cheat Sheetemail spam filters still look at the content of your emails when deciding what to allow through and what to send to junk.

There is a long list of keywords to avoid using which you can find here.

I know realistically you can't avoid all of those keywords without making it almost impossible to write emails so use your best judgment, and realize that context plays a big part in what is viewed as spam, and what isn't.

Note: Apart from avoiding keywords, it's good practice to not use too many symbols or punctuation marks (i.e $$$, !!). And keep your emails formatted consistently throughout (especially if you are sending professional HTML emails).

2. Using a Trusted Email Server / IP Address

What is said is just as important as who says it, right? Well, the content of your email is one thing, but where that email originates from is arguably more important.

Ever notice how emails from large organizations almost never end up in your junk folder? Even if some of them are irrelevant.

That's because their server reputation is so high. One of the reasons why companies use Google Apps, for instance, is because sending through Google's server almost always ensures that their emails will reach the inbox.

That's why at GuessBox when sending cold emails to leads we use SendGrid. They provide regular server reputation information and allow us to setup sending through dedicated IPs (I'll talk about why that is important later).

Consequently, on cold emails, we typically receive deliverability rates of 98%+, open rates of 80%+ and responses between 15% - 30%.

3. Setting Up Email Authentication to Verify Your Domains

Almost every email that ended up in my spam folder failed to do this. Setting up email authentication is a must for any business that wants to send out emails to their customers, let alone do cold outreach.

I cover setting it up in great detail in the post above, so please click that link to learn more.

If you use Gmail you may have received an email from somebody whose picture just looks an exclamation point. When opened this email Google generally provides a warning. A lot of the time that is because the sender is unverified.

So what is email authentication?

In short, authenticating your emails means providing an identity to your emails for mail servers to register. Once your domain is authenticated using DKIM (DomainKeys) and SPF (Sender Policy Framework) at the minimum (and usually DMARC) that tells the server that you are who you say you are and stops forged emails getting through.

As a result, this increases your email deliverability and in turn, your open, click and response rates. Read more above.

4. Being Flagged Sucks So Check Blacklists

If everything seems alright but your emails are still ending up in junk then you might be blacklisted.

Being blacklisted is more than an annoyance, in extreme cases, it could result in your hosting provider shutting down your account. So it's smart to keep an eye on popular blacklists, you can do this by visiting MxToolBox's Blacklist Checker and typing in your domain or IP.

MxToolBox also has a plethora of great features for anybody who wants to stay on top of their email.

Note: There are significant different blacklists from different countries so being on 1 or 2 doesn't mean it's the end of the road for you. Being placed on any of the lists below however should give you room for concern as they are the most popular lists and have the most pull with hosting/email providers.

CBLNJABL.orgSORBSSpamcopSpamhaus

4.5 Dealing With Being Blacklisted

Getting removed from a blacklist can be as simple as waiting it out (i.e Spamhaus makes you wait 6 months and not send out any emails they deem to be Spam) or as time-consuming as manually contacting each blacklist and requesting removal.

If you don't want to do that but still ensure your emails get delivered you can change the IP you are sending from (this typically requires purchasing a dedicated IP from your host or email sending provider).

Doubling down on the above sometimes filters may blacklist the domain you are sending from in which case it would be wise to use a different domain.And finally, if all else fails (arguably, one step before that) you can also switch your web host/email host.

This will give you an opportunity to start fresh and build your IP reputation on a different domain, hosted by a different company. Just be careful, because if you have to repeat this process, then it's probably something you're doing wrong.

We denounce all forms of spam, and email that does not comply with the CAN SPAM Act 2003.

There are loopholes and workarounds but outright spam is reprehensible. I will leave the technicalities of what is and isn't spam for another post.

5. Avoid Selling in Your First Touch / Intro Email

The thing that many people get wrong is trying to sell their product or service too much, particularly in the first email they send someone.

Your first email should just be an introduction of who you are, why you're sending this email, a brief description of your company, and call to action (ideally in the form of a meeting), and ideally under 5 sentences in length.

Not doing this or trying to get your email lead to buy your product through using discounts, payment links or other incentives is a surefire way of getting them clicking the 'this email is spam' button and getting any future emails moved directly into junk.

6. Using a Dedicated IP and Email Server

Dedicated IP addresses are simply IPs that are not used by anyone else and belong to you. By default, most mail servers on your hosting plan will be using shared IPs which means everybody on that subnet is using them to send emails too. This can lower your IP reputation and decrease the chance that they will land in your prospect's inbox.

Note: This is under the assumption that you are sending email through your own server (the same one where your website is hosted) rather than via a trusted email service provider (ESP) like SendGrid, Google Apps, Mailgun, Amazon, Yahoo etc.

Even though those trusted providers have high quality shared IPs which should be fine for most people wanting to run email campaigns, send transactional emails to their users or do outreach if you want to go a step further you can always request a dedicated IP.

7. Avoid Bounces and Honor Unsubscribes

Apart from getting your emails marked as spam, not honoring unsubscribes is an easy way to reduce your server reputation.

So if you have a global do not send list, or a list of unsubscriptions make sure you do not send to them. After all, they are called unsubscribes for a reason.

Finally, sending to a good deal of email addresses that fail to arrive because they are invalid or just bounce can so harm your IP reputation.

The best way to deal with that is to add bounces to global do not send lists (aka suppression lists) so that your email app doesn't accidentally try to continue sending mail.

Additionally, you can use email verification apps to test out your list before sending, so that you can remove the emails that are going to bounce before they do.

'Rapport' this, rapport 'that'. If you're in the world of sales, ever searched for a job, or attended a networking conference, building rapport is the first thing people tell you to try and do.

There isn't a big difference for email leads or people you are contacting via a B2B outbound campaign. Apart from the obvious one... body language or in the case of email, a lack thereof.

So, what do you do when you can't rely on body signal cues to communicate your intentions with a person? Here's a list of ways easy ways to build rapport with an email lead.

1. Avoid Being Too Formal

Take it down a notch.

There isn't a specific amount of formality and colloquialism that you should apply to your emails but keep in mind that you don't want your email to read like a rehearsed speech or a TED talk.

Next time you're sending an email with the aim of getting your objectives met (be it a push for a meeting, a sign-up or some other kind of call to action) don't be too formal. You're speaking to somebody probably at work, probably in the middle of doing something else.

The keyword here is somebody, not something. You're not speaking with a computer so don't be afraid to lighten up a little.

One time, when discussing the use of formality in emails someone went as far as to say that according to their tests emails with minor punctuation or spelling mistakes yielded better responses because the reader felt like the sender was human rather than some bot, which is super important for obvious reasons.

Example: Here's part of a 'light' email I have used that got me response rates of above 25% on a cold email campaign.

Hey Martin,

Great job with managing to get {Company} to what it is today. I know you probably had other companies before this one, but SO many start-ups fail every day.

But I digress... let me introduce myself.

My name is Eric Azizian and I recently built a B2B lead generation platform & outbound email app called GuessBox.

In fact, I used it to find your email and contact information (Sorry :)

See how it's almost like I'm having a conversation? Albeit, with myself for now. But you get what I mean. Your first touch email works best when you imagine it as an introduction to a wider conversation you're going to have. After all, before texting and digital messaging were a thing email was the way you would converse with someone digitally.

2. Don't Be Too Funny

In the same vein of not being too formal, by no means should you try to be too funny. Imagine a spectrum between being too formal, and speaking as if you're close friends. Now aim for a happy medium.

When I say don't be too funny this encompasses all elements of trying too hard. That means no emojis. No excessive smilies. No memes. No gifs (unless they are a snapshot of your product). And limit your jokes and niceties. Be professional.

At the end of the day, people might just think you're crazy.

Like everything, I speak from my experience. So here is an example of me trying to be funny in a cold email, by using a parodied version Liam Neeson's monologue from the movie Taken wherein, 'my particular set of skills' was to do with offering really good customer service.

I don't have money. But what I do have is a particular set of skills, skills that I have acquired from a long career in offering excellent lead generation. Skills that make me very useful for somebody like you. If you agree to have a short call with me, discussing the benefits of what I can do for you, that'll be the end of it. I won't reach out again. But if you don't, well... I thank you for your time and hope you don't take this email too seriously.

The point of the story is to know your audience and save the jokes for your friends.

3. Use First & Last Names

By this stage, I'm sure this is considered common sense more the former than the latter, but nonetheless, I feel like I should mention it.

If you collect names on your subscription pages, newsletter forms or in the leads you generate from software like GuessBox then make sure to use them in your emails.

Use of names doesn't need to be limited to your subject line. Sometimes, you'll get a better response if you skip the subject, and correctly place them in your message body, for instance when asking a question.

Nick, does this sound like something that might be useful for helping brand growth?

Interestingly enough, if you really want to perk the interest of your email lead and demonstrate your research skills, you can even include their full name, but be careful because if done incorrectly, it can just seem a little... weird.

Here's an example that boosted my open rates by 30%.

Nick, are you the Nick Mensin behind Company X? I read about you in publication Y and wanted to introduce myself.

Flattery - you are mentioning their success of being of featured in whatever paper or a website you saw them on.

Research - you are showing that you have done your research, and thereby stand out from all the other emails they get.

Five Sentences or Less - you are managing to keep your email and introduction short whilst making every word count.

Importance by Association - if they are important enough to be discussed in some publication, then you must be important to want to speak with them. Right? Well... maybe not. But the human brain works on generalizations to explain social contact.

4. Mention Mutual Connections

The interconnectedness of the internet and the way in which social media provides a searchable database of nearly half the world's population is a testament to society's innate need for community belonging.

This shouldn't be taken for granted, and can definitely be utilized when trying to build rapport with a cold email lead/prospect.

There are three simple tricks you can do to quickly find whether or not you have mutual friends or connections with the person you are about to contact.

Check their LinkedIn profile for mutual connections and mention them in your email as it builds your credibility and generates more rapport.

Assuming you have the prospect's email you can paste it into your Facebook search bar, and if it is linked with an account Facebook will display it along with any mutual friends you may have.

Note: Typically people don't use their business emails (which are presumably what you are going to be emailing) to setup their Facebook accounts. Rather, their personal emails. Nonetheless, step 2 is still worth a try.

6.State Why Your Prospect's Product is Better Than Their Competitor's

Back to flattery on this one.

When you write the intro for your first touch email (and remember you can always use multiple opening sentences simultaneously and run A/B tests using GuessBox's Email Spintax feature), try naming at least one thing that you prefer about your prospect's product over their competitors.

Once again this provides flattery and demonstrates that you have done your research by writing a more personalized email.

Tip: If you really want to be clever with this, there is scraping and machine learning software you can use to extract specific excerpts from articles published by your prospect or from their website and include them directly in your email by using a tag such as {excerpt}.

Business directories like CrunchBase, Angellist, Owler may feature recent and/or speculative company news.

Look at recent posts social media posts from employees at the company.

Setup Google Alerts to immediately notify if there is any mention of keywords related to that company/employee/industry etc.

There are many aggregators of posts, social articles, press releases etc and many other analytic companies (i.e BuzzSumo) that can be useful.

7. Talk About The Prospect's Town

Another intro variation you can use to generate rapport with a prospect is one that mentions where they are from or something unique you liked about their town last time you visited.

A lot of people are proud of where they come from, or where they live. This is probably best depicted when it comes to sports teams, people sure do get passionate about those! Bumper stickers and all.

Location makes up part of a person's identity, so if you want to build some rapport mention something positive that stood out to you about the person's town. With the help of services like Google Street View and review websites, you can narrow it down further to a local cafe, or theatre or landmark. Just don't say anything that you can't backup if pressed on because that will ruin any rapport you may have established.

Conclusion

And that's it! Hopefully, the information above will help you build better, stronger rapport with your clients, prospects, and leads. As always feedback, shares, and suggestions are welcome!

Edit: This post was originally published on the 18th of August, 2017. However, due to technical issues it has been republished on the 1st of August, 2018.

In a time where we are inundated with a stream of endless content, ads and emails staying productive can be a difficult task. These days an average inbox is polluted with snappy headlines that ask you to engage with websites that you didn't even know existed.

This is exactly the kind of clutter you don't want to see every time you open your email or try to work on your business. So, we have devised a list of apps that will hopefully declutter, your clutter, streamline communication with clients and customers and help you get back to being the best boss you can be.

Sortd

Marketed as Trello for Email, Sortd brings the power of a task manager to your inbox. You can now prioritize your emails, set follow ups, highlight what's important and more.

Sortd for Gmail

If you are working sales you can use it to segment your prospect into different stages of the sales cycle. And it's available as a mobile app for iOS and Android.

An overall great addition to your suite of email productivity tools, and perfectly complements the rest of the apps in this article.

FullContact

If you're somebody who finds themselves constantly contacting people outside of your organization (i.e. in the form of outreach, or research/recruitment etc) then FullContact is an essential contact management and discovery tool.

FullContact (available for Gmail, iOS, Android, Windows & MacOS

FullContact can also be used for lead research and generation. Simply compose a new email through Gmail and if the email address you are sending to is valid there is a high chance that FullContact has information about that person (they boast a database of over 20 million records).

If you don't have the email of your prospect, you can also test different variations of it (i.e. eric.azizian@guessbox.io, eric@guessbox.io, eazizian@guessbox.io) by placing them in your 'To' field and FullContact will test each one and until it's got a match at which point it will display information about that person.

Assistant.to

Sick of going back and forth trying to find a suitable time when scheduling meetings? Well, with Assistant.to you can make that a thing of the past.

Assistant.to (Email Meeting Scheduling Demonstration)

Personally, this is one of my favorite tools as it saved me an incomprehensible amount of time, particularly when doing outreach to a large number of people.

When you want to schedule a meeting simply click on the Assistant.to button that appears in your message body, and it will pop up with a calendar in which you can add the times you are free. The app will then go ahead and add those times to your email so that your recipient can simply click on a time that works for them, and the meeting will automatically be added to both of your calendars.

Boomerang For Gmail

There are other extensions that allow you to schedule email to send later, but they are generally heavier apps bundled with a lot of other stuff. If you want a simple extension that nicely fits into your Gmail window then Boomerang is the app for you.

Boomerang for Gmail (email scheduler and snoozer and 'send later')

Here are some of the features it offers:

Email scheduling

Boomerang Responsible (suggests how likely your email is to get a reply)

Email scheduling based on behavior (i.e. if no reply, if opened but no reply etc).

Boomerang is a nifty little tool from a great team that regularly updates it. You can use it to maximize your productivity by not having to constantly check your email, or even if you want to pretend that you have been working all night to your boss by scheduling an email to go out to him early morning or night ;)

Crystal

If you haven't heard of Crystal yet then you're in for a somewhat creepy surprise. Crystal determines how to send the perfect email based on analysis of your recipient's personality.

Crystal's unparalleled accuracy is sometimes scary but useful

Frankly the accuracy is quite shocking, and their database size is equally impressive. You can try it out on yourself if you want to get an idea of how Crystal works.

Similar to Boomerang it fits nicely into Gmail and depending on the objective of your email (i.e. get a coffee meeting, ask for a raise, follow up after a sale etc) Crystal will tell how to word your email (and any later interaction) for the highest chance of achieving your objective.

Grammarly

We all make mistakes. We're human after all (apologies to all the canine, feline readers). So, instead of letting those mistakes go unnoticed next time you are writing an important email Grammarly will notify you of spelling errors, sentence failures, and grammatical faux pas.

grammarly for Chrome (available on other platforms too)

Additionally, once you activate Grammarly it will start working in every text field that appears in your browser. That means whatever you write online, be it an email, document or blog post-Grammarly will be working to improve your writing.

This is by no means a comprehensive list, and I'm sure I'll update it in the near future. But at the risk of going on for too long, I decided to include only my favorite and most used apps.

Please feel free to send in your personal recommendations and if I like it I'll add it to the list!

MixMax

I was in two minds whether to include MixMax on this list because I personally don't use it. But, I figured it is a lovely tool and a lot of my friends who do use it are incredibly happy with it.

MixMax is the swiss army knife of Gmail apps. It offers so many features from email scheduling to appointment scheduling all the way to bulk sending and email tracking, that there is a little bit of a learning curve. However, once you do get it, there is no reason why MixMax can't become a part of your Gmail arsenal.

The app is beautifully designed and has support for both Gmail and Google Inbox.

Edit: September 19th, 2017.

SalesHandy

If you want to keep your email campaigns within Gmail then SalesHandy is one of the most seamless tools for the job. With everything from unlimited email tracking to mass personalization. SalesHandy is an affordable solution to running your B2B email campaigns.

Here are some notable features:

Auto Follow Ups (those things I always talk about)

Mail Merge / Personalization

Plenty of CRM Integrations

GMass

I was in two minds about listing GMass in this blog post because I consider a trade secret and because we are currently figuring out potential collaboration opportunities so I didn't want to plug a company that GuessBox may be associated with (in the interest of staying impartial).

That being said, Gmass is hands down one of the most powerful email marketing tools around today. From SendGrid integration to auto-follow ups it is a must have for anybody with a Google Apps account, and perfectly complements the leads generated by GuessBox.

Notable Features:

Google Sheets Integration

Advanced Reporting (opens, clicks, bounces, replies etc)

Automatic Follow Ups

Email Scheduling

Bookmark and share this post because I update it regularly as I receive new recommendations for useful apps and tools.

Edited: 01.08.2018

]]>You may have noticed an eerie quietness stemming from the GuessBox team over the last few months. I can finally shed light on what has been going on, and what I have personally been working on.

This will come in a more comprehensive post later today, but in the meantime

]]>http://blog.guessbox.io/guessbox-is-coming-back-from-development/5b59b8d060d7490b0e7a7d83Mon, 05 Jun 2017 09:16:37 GMTYou may have noticed an eerie quietness stemming from the GuessBox team over the last few months. I can finally shed light on what has been going on, and what I have personally been working on.

This will come in a more comprehensive post later today, but in the meantime I want to announce that after some maintenance, the GuessBox website and app is back up and running. We are taking bug reports, so if you notice some functionality not working as expected, please feel free to leave a message using the live chat form on our website, or contact me directly at eric@guessbox.io

Edit
1:15am
All GuessBox functions are back up and running. Including targeted lead search by industry, location and job title,automatic email campaigns (with auto follow up), SendGrid integration and much much more.

So you've set up a digital presence on the Internet and are hungry for customers to buy your products and services. How do you reel customers in so that your business is a smashing success? Though there are a lot of marketing methods out there, starting with the foundational basics is the best way to get a solid footing for your business. You want to implement the simplest marketing techniques first so you can build on these and wade into more advanced techniques in the future. So what are simple, easy-to- implement marketing tactics you could use to get your company off the ground? Here we list seven ways to promote your business globally:

1. Locally List Your Business

It's important to first establish a local presence online. Not only is this great for SEO purposes, you are making it easy for locally based users to find you when they google their city or state of residence with your company's services. Register your business with Google Places -- this will make you easy-to- find on Google searches and Google Maps. The process of registering is easy. All you have to do is submit a registration form, get your business verified through a confirmation process that involves either a phone call or snail mail, and you're all set. Yahoo is also worth registering with on its database of companies called Yahoo! Local. Free and easy to register, the process is fast and intuitive. Don't forget to also register with Microsoft's Bing.

2. Use Social Media

Using social media is indispensable for most businesses. A solid investment, platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram allow you to advertise and provide you with a direct method of engagement with your customers. Networking on LinkedIn -- on the individual and business level -- is another solid platform to inform users about your business' services and products.

3. Keep a Blog

A blog filled with quality content that provides unique and compelling information is a solid way to spread word about your company to a wide readership. It is also a way to directly communicate with your customers. The key to a quality blog is to regularly update it so that your customers can expect a constant stream of information. A blog that irregularly posts updates won't do much to advertise your site to Internet users.

An easy way to rehash content is to have a translation services provider pitch your content in other languages, such as Spanish or French. Doing so attracts a foreign audience to your site that may be interested in your products or services.

4. Post Multimedia Posts on YouTube and Flickr

YouTube is an excellent way to lend a highly visual presence to your company. By developing and distributing innovative promotional videos, you will do a lot to garner attention to your company's products and services. Generating content that is compelling and relevant to what you do is an effective way of communicating your company's message. Use it, and your business will take off. Another visually compelling website is Flickr. This site can safely store all your company's photos and allow you to link them back to your website.

5. Optimize Your Website

Search engine optimizing your website for Google and other search engines is extremely important. You want your site to rank well for your keywords right? Then make sure to carry out all online procedures for properly optimizing your site. Since organic searches are the most coveted form of reach for a business, you cannot afford to overlook this vital step.

6. Press Releases

When your company does something that is newsworthy, be smart and create a press release to let the world know about the creative things your company is doing. If well written, people will pick up on it. Hence the power of press release to generate buzz and publicity amongst readers and journalists alike.Many distribution websites exist out there to spread your press releases, such as 24/7 Press Release and PRLog.

7. Join Online Communities

Every industry has its micro-sites and forums that congregate niche communities. Be active about this and chip in regularly to communities that discuss topics relevant to your industry. When you just sign up to a forum and only post every once in a while, you are not helping yourself. The point is for you to become an authority figure within the community, so that others look up to you. By promoting your business through a link in your signature or mentioning your business every once in awhile invites others to explore what your company is about.

This guest post was written by
Denise Recalde is a Senior Content Writer at Day Translations, a human translation services company. A seasoned writer and editor with eleven years of experience under her belt, she is a bonafide wordsmith who loves playing with the written word creatively and always takes care to lend a certain hue of snap and color to her drafts. Always one to rise up to challenges, she has traveled to 14 countries and has worked on a smorgasbord of writing projects that spanned several industries, from finance to health to beauty and fashion.

A few days ago I was notified by the congratulatory remarks in my LinkedIn profile that GuessBox.io had officially turned a year old.

Personally, and professionally the last year had been so tumultuous that I completely lost track of time.

But I digress... this post isn't just about the fact that we are a year old. I also want to talk about some of the new things you can be expecting from GuessBox in the first quarter of 2017 and a discount code that will give you 50% off any package you choose FOREVER (only 50 codes available so be quick).

Numero Uno - More Integrations#####

Though, I'm quite happy with the integrations we do have so far, it's evident that we can't become complacent. So, this is an official announcement to say that we will be integrating ReplyApp.io (the cool email solution) and Ninjodo (the simplest CRM I have ever used) into GuessBox.io very soon.

Those are just a few of the many things the GuessBox team will be integrating into the app. Some other things include:

Zapier integrations

Other popular CRM integrations

Smoother integration with Google Apps

FullContact (already integrated but only on admin side)

Numero Dos - More Data!#####

That's right. Our market is global, and their needs must align with the quality and quantity of their desired data that we have. We are making a big push to make not only the technical aspect of lead searching within GuessBox more user friendly, but also adding a few million new verified email leads to our database.

Numero Tres - Tutorial Videos######

Apart from general demo and tutorial videos explaining certain functions and concepts, this year we are going to be making a big push to create videos that not only teach the tech side of email marketing, but how to become an effective email marketer.

Numero Quattro - GuessBox Academy#####

Thanks to an idea a friend of mine gave me recently, GuessBox will be launching a full fledged called... you got it!

Instead of writing another eBook I figured people may be a little bit more engaged if they received an interactive course. To give you a brief run down, this is what it's going to look like (this is subject to change upon release date).

An exclusive webinar at the end of the course where you can ask me any questions you may have directly.

For a sneak peak take a look at the photo below... and keep in mind these headlines MAY change.

50% Off Any GuessBox Package For Life#####

If you have made it this far then congratulations! You're in for a treat. As a part of our one year anniversary we are giving 50 codes that get you 50% off any GuessBox package. So you better be quick because once those codes are snagged up you will no longer be entitled to the discount.

Simply use the code: ONEYEAR when checking out to get the discount applied to your order.

But wait there's more!

To really sweeten the deal for the next week, you will be able to get access to our basic package for only $9.95 that's down from $49.95.

No coupon code necessary, just visit the GuessBox website scroll down to the payment boxes and click continue.

And... if you a tell a friend and they decide to sign up you get an extra month of usage absolutely free!

In case you forgot what that package contains here's a short list (though, you also get access to the email system for a short time too):

Note: You can get it for $9.95 started by pressing the start now button above. What do you have to lose? You can cancel at any time.

That's all for now, folks! Lots of cool happening at GuessBox.io this quarter make sure to subscribe to this blog for instant updates.

GuessBox began from an idea to create a simple, yet effective B2B lead generation app. GuessBox v 1.0 came to life within a Google Spreadsheet. It wasn't fast, it wasn't flashy but it got the job done!

Almost a year later the GuessBox of today looks like a far removed cousin of the spreadsheet app from back then.

But, I digress..

In this guide you will learn how to create your first automated B2B email campaign using GuessBox.

Step 1: Setup SendGrid

Right now GuessBox integrates with SendGrid.com for sending. It makes the entire process super easy, and provides you the user with a set of nice analytics.

Visit http://sendgrid.com and create an account. You can start with the free one, though if you want higher inbox rates it is encouraged to get a paid account.

Once you have created an account, click on settings > API keys within SendGrid. From this page you will now need to create an API key and then copy it into the respective field on the GuessBox settings page.

Step 2: Configuring Your IMAP Settings

As per the guide in the link above, please proceed to setup your IMAP settings. These are important as they ensure that GuessBox will correctly reply to emails that have yet to receive a reply.

Note: A few things have changed (mainly design elements) from the guide above, but they should be pretty self explanatory.

The picture below is of your settings page, note where it allows you to toggle on/off the auto follow up settings, and specify how many follow ups the application should send (and when).

Step 3: Domain Authentication (optional)

This step is technically optional though I wouldn't suggest skipping it unless you want your emails to go straight into the junk folder of your prospective client.

For more information on how to authenticate your domains so that mail servers will be able to distinguish your email from spam, read this guide.

Step 4: Uploading Contacts

Let's assume in this case you already have your contacts, and won't be emailing them directly from the GuessBox search results.

Click on the 'Contacts List (Beta)' link that is located on the left hand side of your screen, in the navigation menu.

And then all you need to do is press 'Upload CSV' in the top right corner, and select your .csv file with the leads / people you would like to add into an email campaign.

Note: As you can see in the demonstration below, there are a few guidelines that your file must abide by in order to be accepted by the website.

Step 5: Configuring Automatic Follow Ups

In the case that a person you email does not reply to your email, you can set GuessBox to automatically send him/her a reminder email of your choice after a certain period of time.

Go back to your settings page, and scroll down to IMAP settings. Select how many follow ups you would like to send, and the after how long they should be sent out. Once you have done that, press 'Add More' to create different follow up messages.

Toggle the IMAP / Auto Follow Up switch to On and then press 'Save' down the bottom.

Example below:

Step 6: Using Personalization & Spintax when Sending Emails

When writing your first touch emails, and follow ups remember to make use of the personalization tags available, and spintax.

Here are some examples of the tags you can use:

{FirstName}

{Company}

{Domain}

{Role}

More will be available very soon

By putting words, phrases or links in curly brackets and dividing them with a line as per the image below, GuessBox will automatically rotate through those options with every email it sends. This can be used in both the subject, and body of your email.

To send an email to your uploaded contacts, press 'Send Email' next to the group you uploaded on the Contacts List page.

Write your email, then press 'Preview' to view your email, and send a test email to an address of your choosing.

If you have already set up auto follow ups from your settings page then you don't need to press the 'Auto Follow Up' button.

Once you are ready, press 'Send' and your campaign will be sent out. Check Google Analytics & SendGrid.com for analytics regarding your campaign.

Step 7: Miscellaneous

Want higher response rates? Remember to use a professional email signature and add it automatically to every email sent by visiting 'Mail Settings' on SendGrid.com and clicking on 'Footer'

Note: Don't forget to add an option for users to unsubscribe at the bottom of your emails. If you fail to do this, you will be technically breaking the law, and we will have to launch an investigation into the type of email you are sending.

To automatically append an unsubscribe link / message at the bottom of each email, visit 'Tracking' on SendGrid and click on 'Subscription' to activate it.

Note: When writing your emails try to keep them to five sentences or less in length. Don't ramble too long about your product, and establish objective early on.

Always remember to follow up (because people are typically busy) and keep an eye on your sender reputation.

GuessBox can be used for sending out newsletters and general communication emails as well. You don't only need to use it for B2B cold email outreach.

If you can't find a specific data set on the website, don't hesitate to contact us using the live chat form on our homepage or email us here.

And that's it! This was an introductory guide on getting started with GuessBox and its email functionality for your B2B marketing campaigns. Stay tuned for our upcoming eBook and remember if you found this post valuable - share it with your friends!

This month was very difficult on all fronts. While we continued to receive a higher than usual number of sign ups thanks to some recent press features, I was personally unavailable for the majority of the time due to illness, and travel, and that definitely delayed the progress of some things. I would like to apologize to anybody who personally affected by my absence.

Thankfully, with the help of a great team we still managed to release a few new game changing updates to our B2B email automation system.

The ability to specify how many automatic follow ups to send out if no reply is received to your original message. The minimum is 1 (if activated) and the maximum is 10.

You can now specify how long to wait until the first follow up is sent out (minimum 8 hours, maximum 1 week).

You can use Spintax to add variations to your email:

{Hello|Hey|How are you?} will automatically randomize with email sent. You can apply this same technique to subject lines, links and anything really. Add as much variation as you want to your emails & test your results!

Are you looking for a product that you can use to contact your own set of leads with? GuessBox now gives you the option of uploading your own list of contacts in .csv format and then personalizing your messages. See below.

This means that you can now set up full B2B outbound email campaigns to either the leads you generate from within GuessBox or to your own personal list. If you really want to get creative you can even use GuessBox to send newsletters to your existing clients.

Note: All contacts and campaigns you upload or run are completely encrypted and secure. We have zero way of viewing, accessing or sharing them in any way.

If you have reply tracking set up all replies will now appear under history > auto follow up history.

You can now send 'test' emails prior to sending out full campaign. To do this, click on 'Preview' then 'Send Test Email'

You can now 'clear' and 'download' your entire sent email history going to History > Email History and then clicking one of the two buttons below.

More advanced search functions, now taking into account different keywords that mean the same thing (i.e. NY & New York. US & United States or USA etc). These can also be used the multiple keyword search function by separating each search with a comma. See below. (i.e NY, LA & Chicago)

Easier to use IMAP settings and toggles for reply checking, and auto follow up.

Closer integration with our friends at ReplyApp. We are working towards having a full integration live shortly.

Documentation regarding available industries. Click here to find out what industries are available to be searched from within GuessBox right now.

We also noticed the auto suggest feature was acting up, so we have temporarily removed it whilst we work on improving it.

Currently working on integrating FullContact to make things even easier for some of enterprise clients.

Note: A full demo video describing each of the individual parts mentioned above is being made. Please visit and subscribe to our YouTube page for further information.

That's all for now! Stay tuned for a plethora of great content this week, and remember to share & subscribe for exclusive offers and discounts!

Well, since then GuessBox has continued to grow and I've continued to experiment with different strategies for effective B2B outbound email marketing.

Needless to say, I realized that there is so much more I could have included in that ebook. So, I've started writing an intermediate upgrade to the original.

If you are just getting started I would still highly recommend you read that book as it can never hurt to get some extra knowledge and practical advice. But... version 2.0 of the original is almost finished, and will cover things like:

New strategies for increasing response rates by using email signatures.

More email copy examples that have been proven to receive response rates of above 20% on cold emails.

More subject line examples that receive 90% open rates on cold emails.

Psychological, and marketing hacks that will turn your business prospects into hungry leads with just two emails!

Real life case studies of different wacky experiments and the data driven impact they have (or don't have) on open, response rates, clickthrough rates.

Links and explanations to and for other third party resources that will help you check your emails before you send them, and then manage your follow up to illicit the best possible response from prospects. All the while, creating a sales 'pipeline' for you right inside your favorite email client.

And much much more.

The new book will be called "The Entrepreneur's Guide To Effective B2B Email Marketing" and is scheduled for release on the 1st of August*.

If this sounds like something you might want to read enter your email in the subscription box that just popped up, or share this article with your friends.

As always, all of this information will be provided free of charge and I am always available for questions or chatter! :)

Edit 29th August:* Due to some unforeseen circumstances the release of this guide has had to have been pushed back to early September. We would like to apologize to anybody who has been eagerly awaiting its release, but we promise that the wait will be worth it.

Over the last few weeks we made a really hard push to make outbound email marketing a more accessible feature in GuessBox. I know we started off small, with a simple 'send to email' button once you had selected your target leads, but have a look at some of the new things we are releasing today. I know I'm happy :)

Settings page redesign, now with options for following up 'automatically' if your lead doesn't reply after a certain period of time.

Cleaner user interface for submitting details, and instructions provided on the spot in the form of written and video tutorials.

We are now working with ReplyApp.io to make them one of our exclusive email sending counterparts. As previously, we only offered SendGrid as an integration. That's no hate on SendGrid. Love You SendGrid!

Slightly off topic, but we have added over 500,000 new records to the GuessBox B2B database.

User defined follow up times. If you can see from the screenshot above, now you the user can specify the maximum amount of times you want an 'automatic' follow up to go out, and how long to wait prior to sending it out. A great addition to your outbound email marketing campaign!

Auto follow up also has a neat little toggle switch from which you can turn it off and on and any time and it won't interfere with previous emails sent.

You can 'clear' your auto follow up history emails within GuessBox in case it is getting a little messy.

Create Your Own Campaigns

Probably one of the biggest features we've been working on is the ability to not only email people you find through GuessBox's search results, but also have the ability to use it as your own complete outbound email marketing solution.

This means, being able to upload and tag your own lists AND continue to use mail merge features such as {firstname}, {company} etc.

Check it out:

But Wait! There's More!#####

Aside from all these cool features which I can't wait for you guys to play with. We have also implemented a special version of A/B testing.

That's right. Intentionally, old school styled to keep in the nature of our company.

When writing up your emails you can now use 'spintax' in addition to the typical mail merge tags.

What is 'spintax'? Good question! If you were in this space around 10 years ago, programs were being built with something called 'spintax' and simply put it's a method of A/B testing and/or randomizing your messages.

How does it work?

{Hey|Hello|What's Up?} If I put words, phrases, even links into curly brackets like so and then divide each one with a bar | GuessBox will go ahead and rotate whatever is in those brackets every time it sends a new email thus giving you a really easy and fun way of A/B testing your copy and potentially avoiding limitation issues if you are using certain kinds of servers. You know who you are :)

To wrap up, here's a full example of an email one might write.

Hi {FirstName},

What's been happening at {Company} recently?

I heard that {there was|something happened|an incident occurred}? and I wanted to know if everything was {ok|back to normal now?|good again?}

Thanks,

Mike

Perhaps, the email above isn't the greatest example but it should give you an idea with a use case for Spintax (hopefully, it's not something unfortunate, like a work incident). But, at least you know that you can A/B test your emails.

Note: If you noticed I bolded the standard mail merge tags above, it was to highlight the fact that they do not interfere with any use of 'Spintax' or A/B testing.

That's it for now, I've probably missed something because there has been so many new adjustments and improvements, but I'll make sure to write up some lengthier documentation and make a video demo.

And remember if this article helped you. Don't be shy, share it with a friend using the buttons to the left of the screen or down below :)

This idea was inspired by my friend, Luke at Ghacklabs who wrote up a list of startup slack groups here. At GuessBox we are committed to helping the startup community, and those who are interested in learning more about successes and struggles that occur in a growing startup on a daily basis.

On that note, if you would like to join the GuessBox Slack group then please apply below for an invitation, it's absolutely free!

Until next time, we have some **outbound email marketing**, and **email signature marketing** content coming up.

Not too mention more information about our soon to be released advances outbound email features.

Remember to subscribe to our newsletter using if you want to stay updated with all the latest marketing hacks from the lead generation space, and email marketing posts from our Blog.

One of the benefits of using a Google Apps / SendGrid email integration with GuessBox is the access you get to more technical features in addition to the standard open rate, response and click through rate reports.

Today, I'm going to be talking about how you can boost your email deliverability, and significantly reduce the chance of getting your emails sent to junk by using domain/email authentication.

Email authentication is most commonly done by adding DKIM and SPF signage to your domain's DNS records. This might sound complicated now, but once you get the hang of it - it's actually way easier than it sounds.

But, what is DKIM and SPF? you might be asking yourself right about now. They are the two most popular methods used to authenticate your emails and make sure they are originating from your mail server and not from an imposter pretending to be you.

Getting Started: Update Your DNS Details

A lot of people cringe when they are asked to update their server's DNS information.

Understandably, this fear comes from the fact that almost everyone who has owned a website has had at some point experienced a DNS horror story, where perhaps they incorrectly updated their DNS details, and all of a sudden their website goes down, or perhaps their emails stop getting delivered.

But don't worry, that won't be happening today because I'm going to show you the simplest, and quickest way to start managing your DNS without the need to wait 24 hours for your DNS to propagate. Additionally, you'll receive some website speed and security enhancements automatically.

Introduction to CloudFlare

If you're a small business owner, or your business doesn't have a heavy web presence in the form of an app, there's a good chance that you may have never heard of CloudFlare.

Simply put once set up, CloudFlare is a service which routes all your website traffic through their services. This typically means your website is more secure, loads faster and is less prone to 'going down'.

"Once your website is a part of the CloudFlare community, its web traffic is routed through our intelligent global network. We automatically optimize the delivery of your web pages so your visitors get the fastest page load times and best performance. We also block threats and limit abusive bots and crawlers from wasting your bandwidth and server resources. The result: CloudFlare-powered websites see a significant improvement in performance and a decrease in spam and other attacks.

On average, a website on CloudFlare:
Loads twice as fast,
uses 60% less bandwidth,
has 65% fewer requests and
is way more secure."

With that being said, that isn't the reason why I'm mentioning using CloudFlare to help with your DNS.

As you will see in the video walkthrough below, the main reason for using CloudFlare (the free package will suffice) is because it makes managing your DNS and making future changes to it a whole lot easier than using your domain registrar or web host.

You'll find yourself less error prone, and experiencing less delays in DNS propagation etc. Also, it means that if you do something wrong, you're not stuck waiting 24 hours for your website to return. In a matter of 30 seconds you can undo your changes and they will be live. That's why when it comes to setting up email/domain authentication (and any other third party services you use that require DNS adjustments) I would recommend just placing everything into CloudFlare.

So when you have some time go ahead and sign up to CloudFlare, migrate all your existing DNS records there, and make sure you point your nameservers to the ones CloudFlare will allocate for you (otherwise, nothing will work).

Authenticating Your Google Apps Email

If you're using Google Apps to manage your email which it seems like most companies are these days, then it's important you first start off by enabling domain authentication.

To do this, log into your Admin panel located at http://admin.google.com > click on apps > select Google Apps > choose Gmail > scroll down to where it says 'Authenticate Email' and press that.

If you aren't provided with a DKIM/TXT record by default, press generate new record, and then the take key that Google provides you with and add it to your DNS as a TXT record. If you're using CloudFlare it shouldn't be very difficult.

Once that has been added, go back to Google and press 'Start Authentication'. It will verify that you have set up your DNS correctly and start authenticating your emails.

Woo! Congratulations, you just got the first step out of the way. Take five, and I'll be here when you come back.

Note: If you are unsure about something, Google provides official documentation on how to setup DKIM authentication here.

Setting Up SPF

Next we want to 'sign' your domain/emails by enabling SPF. It's a pretty simple process, just add the following TXT record to your DNS.

v=spf1 include:_spf.google.com ~all

Google provides a full breakdown about what to do below. Take note of how they recommend enabling SPF if you have it on multiple domains.

Authenticating With SendGrid & GuessBox

Now if you want to start sending emails with GuessBox, at this point in time SendGrid will be email service provider (ESP) that we will be integrating with.

All this means is that the process we completed above with Google Apps, we are going to do the same thing with SendGrid (you can use your Google Apps email).

Authenticating with SendGrid is much the same, the only difference is, they will provide slightly different information for you to add into your DNS.

To begin, log into SendGrid > click on settings from the left hand navigation bar > choose Whitelabels. You'll be presented with another run down of the benefits of signing/authenticating/white labeling your domain.

Once you've had a read of that, press 'Add Domain' and follow the prompts. SendGrid will give you some CNAME records to add into your DNS.

Once everything is verified, and validated. Go back to the same page and click on 'Add Email Link'. Once again, follow the prompts and enter in the CNAME records provided into your DNS.

In order to offer better advice to both GuessBox users and GuessBox as a whole, I'm always running tests. Tests to see what can one do to improve their open, response, click through and conversions rate when using cold outbound emails as a customer acquisition strategy.

We all know that the majority of your success with outbound email is going to rely on how engaging your subject line is, followed by your email copy, followed by your call to action / objective etc, and whether or not you are making sure to 'follow up' with your prospects.

However, through recent tests there is something else I found that makes an impact. Of course, this isn't a be all and end all of marketing hacks, but if it works and even boosts your percentages by 5% then it's worth it.

To give you an example of a professional email signature versus a regular signature, look at the two emails below:

Regular Email Signature:

Above you can see a test campaign I ran targeting people off Facebook, based on their interests. This campaign still received a response rate of about 10% which is decent enough.

Now, let's take a look at what happens when we upgrade our email signature.

Professional Email Signature:

Arguably, you could say this email performed better because the copy was better written, more targeted. Perhaps, however this email copy is significantly longer than the previous email, which is generally a no-no.

But... there is one thing that cannot be argued and that is the fact that users responded to and engaged with the signature. In fact, most of positively geared responses I received were from people who had clicked the video link in my signature and wanted to find out more.

Here are some stats from the above email. Remember, this is completely cold, only using data found on GuessBox and a combination of the in built outbound client, and a Gmail plugin.

As you can see a large number of people actually clicked on different links in my email signature which led them to express more interest in the product.

I'm sure you've heard this before, but following up either automatically, or manually when running cold email campaigns is a MUST. Your follow up email is your chance to prove that you actually care about your prospect, convince them that you're not just mass emailing hundreds of people, and offer that 'personalization' with the purpose of getting them to respond to you.

Here are the stats from the associated follow up campaign. Remember these are additional replies etc, that I wouldn't have received, had I not made sure to follow up with everybody who didn't respond the first time.

How To Set Up Your Own Professional Email Signature

There are many services out there that can quickly create email signatures (included below) for you or if you know a little bit of HTML then I have no doubt you can do it yourself.

Note: If you are using Gmail / Google Apps, to change your email signature just log into your account > settings > general and copy / paste what is underneath into your signature box.

If you are using SendGrid, visit mail settings > footer and then you can either copy paste the templates below, or add html code by pressing 'source' on the footer message box.